Death's Angel
by Chibigreen
Summary: Part 3 up. Darkness, pain, demons... What could have possibly twisted a person so much that all he lived for was gaining power and hurting others? This is the story of a boy named Kano, later to become Miboshi of the Seiryuu Seven…
1. In Love

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Fushigi Yuugi.

**Warnings:** Angst, dark magic, demons, character death, and some spoilers for episodes 25 to 44.  There's also going to be a _slight_ spoiler for the OVAs.

Who, or even _what_, the seishi named as Miboshi was: this is a mystery.  The Four Gods Heaven Earth Book showed him as a monster, little better than the demons that he summoned.  But what could have possibly twisted a person so much that all he lived for was gaining power and hurting others?  This is the story… The story of a boy named Kano, later to become Miboshi, the dark monk of the Seiryuu Seven…

**Author's Note:** This is a side story to my fic **_The New Warriors_**, but you do not have to read that to understand this.

**In Love **(Part 1 of 3)

"Hane-chan!  Hane-chan, wait up!"  My fiancée was running ahead of me, her brown hair flowing with the wind.  We were only fifteen still, and her parents did not want her to marry me until she was another year older.  Sometimes we acted more like best friends then a betrothed couple, but we were very happy together and loved each other immensely.

My name is Sei Kano.  I am a normal fifteen-year-old living on the border of Kutou and Konan, but we were just enough on the Kutou side that the Kutou army did not attack us.  In return, we allied ourselves with Kutou, though many of us realized that Konan would treat us more kindly.  However, it was useless to argue that with our elders.  If we switched sides, then Kutou would attack us.  None of us wanted to leave our peaceful village.

Hane-chan continued to run, laughing, and I chased after her.  Finally we reached the edge of the lake that lay outside our village, and we sat down together in the tall grass.  I put my arm around Hane-chan, and she ran her fingers through my dark hair, mussing it, before leaning on my shoulder.  We were content to sit peacefully by the lake.  Nothing else mattered, as long as we were together.

An old wise woman who had passed through had taken an extra careful look at us.  I can still remember what she said as her kind eyes looked into mine.  _"You two are soul mates, child."_

_"Soul mates?"_

_"Yes.  She is your one and true love, the one whom you were destined to love since the birth of your soul, and she has been destined to love you in the same way."_

_"Are of feelings just because of destiny?"_

_"Oh, no, not at all.  I can see that even if you weren't so linked, you would be deeply in love."_

And as we sat there together, I knew that the old wise woman had been right.

*******

The night that was to be our wedding, disaster struck.  Instead of the melody of festivity, the discord of battle stung our village.

The pressures from Kutou had finally grown too great, and our village elders had turned to Konan without the village's knowledge.  Hearing of this, the Kutou army had struck our village as the Konan army had come to help.  The two generals from their respective countries had met in the town's center for a talk, but then had drawn back.  The battle had begun right there.  And now screams of men being torn through by Kutou soldiers surrounded me.  Their force was superior; they were slaughtering both the Konan soldiers and all of the villagers.

I can't find Hane-chan!  Where is she?

I've searched and searched, but I can't find her anywhere.  Finally I go by the lake, the formerly beautiful, peaceful lake that is now crimson with the blood of the men, women, and children that have been slaughtered around it.

Standing in front of it was Hane-chan, and a soldier – Kutou or Konan, I couldn't tell – was aiming a sword at her.  She was at the lake's edge, and had nowhere else to go.

_Swish._

The sword pierced through the air and Hane's heart.  With a gasp of pain, she fell into the lake, her life's blood darkening the water as she sank, alone, to the murky bottom.

Pain tore through my heart; a scream tore from my throat.  "HANE-CHAN!  NOOOOOO!"  I fell to my knees, the pain of the soul being separated from me too great to bear.  But that was followed by anger… a fierce, raging anger that could not be quenched.  I felt a burning on my neck, and the air around me began to grow blue.  Power was causing my hair to rise up around my face.   Power was opening a door to a dark world, but my anger was too great for me to stop it.  "YOU MONSTER!" I shouted, rising up in the air and advancing on the soldier.  I could now see that he was from Kutou.  "Bastard!  How could you kill her?"

The soldier might have been stupid, but he was not a coward.  He turned, saw the frightening, glowing monster that I now resembled, and aimed his sword to run me through.  But he did not have time.  The doorway to darkness was open.

A slime-covered, scaly tentacle rose out of the water.  The Kutou soldier turned around and saw it too late as it wrapped around him and crushed him.  A warty face with a mouth full of clashing and gnashing teeth rose out of the water to chop up the man and swallow him, piece by dismembered piece.  And then it began to work on everyone and anyone around it as I felt my despair rise up above my anger.  More dark portals began to open, and the Kutou army, now a ragged bunch with only the general and a few men left, called a hasty retreat.  The villagers, the Konan army, and most of the village was completely destroyed by the demons.

I collapsed to the ground as my power drained from me.  The energy had allowed me to float high in the air, but I fell and twisted my leg painfully.  The demons had used my power for their own means, and I was completely out of the magic of the blue light.

My mind tried to hold onto consciousness.  From pain, despair, and loss of hope, I eventually sunk into darkness.

**~TBC~**

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	2. In Loneliness

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Fushigi Yuugi.

**Warnings:** Angst, dark magic, demons, character death, and some spoilers for episodes 25 to 44.  There's also going to be a _slight_ spoiler for the OVAs.

**In Loneliness** (Part 2 of 3)

It's been over two years since she died… I sighed in my meditation and shifted uncomfortably.

When I had woken up from my faint after the incident, I had found myself in a monastery.  The monks there told me that a passing traveler had found me, but somehow that did not sound true to me.  And the monastery I was in was somehow dark and devious.  The statues, the murals, everything seemed to point to a god worshipped in the place of Seiryuu.  It made me uncomfortable, but the reason I stayed here was because of the head of their order.

The man was a dark being named Tenkou.  I don't trust him; I don't even like him, but he has been teaching me to control the dark power that killed _everyone_.

If I can learn to control those powers, I will never kill anyone ever again.  A death won't even happen by accident because of me.  But learning from Tenkou still makes me uncomfortable.

That is why I was currently sitting in meditation in my room.  I was disturbed deeply by the subtle hints that Tenkou kept on saying during my lessons.  It seemed as if he was hinting, almost at the level of _ordering_, that I use my powers for foul purposes.  Another curious factor that I encountered in my lessons with him was that he could not do any of the things he was teaching me to do except for summoning demons.  And even that was not the same way I did it.  His was somehow…dark, just like this whole monastery.

I really didn't enjoy learning some of the spells that he's taught me, even if they do help to control my power.  Besides summoning all of the different levels of demons, I now knew how to _control_ the demons and, most importantly, how to banish them.  I also could steal someone's voice, levitate, and do some other nasty magic.  If I could do anything _good_ with my magic, Tenkou never taught me how.  Someday, when I finally left this shrouded monastery, I would find a place where I could master spells to bring people joy.

When I finally left… Was I a guest in this place, or a prisoner?

There was a knock on the door.  "Tenkou-sama wishes to see you, Miboshi-san."  The door opened to reveal one of the dark monks.

No one here calls me 'Kano.'  They all call me 'Miboshi,' which means that I am one of the seven Seiryuu warriors.  My symbol, 'basket,' glows on the back of my neck whenever I use my powers.

I stood to follow the monk.  As usual, he led me to the highest level of the monastery and left me there with the being known as Tenkou.

He had long, silver hair, and his eyes had a cruel look to them.  His face looked almost like a vampire's, but I knew that tales of vampires were just legends.  His black clothing and jewelry was more suited to a king than to someone residing in a monastery.  The large chair he sat on added to that picture of a king or an emperor.

"Welcome, Miboshi."  A dark aura seemed to shroud this place even more than the rest of the monastery.  "You have completed all of the training that I will give you."  Not that you _can't_ give it to me, but you _won't_ give it to me.  I knew that was what he meant.

"And…?"  He was going to ask me for something; I knew it.

"I have a proposition for you.  I am a god, Miboshi, but I long to be the complete ruler of this entire world.  Join me in my quest, help me to fulfill it, and you will be more powerful than all of these puny humans!"  His presence seemed to expand and magnify as he said it, making him seem great and terrible.  But he was more horrible than anything else.

I kept it as a simple refusal.  It is not smart to be rude to anyone who has more or darker powers than your own.  "I can't.  I have no wish to harm anyone."

"You do not wish to help me?  Not even to avenge your lost loved one?"

"You don't know anything about that," my voice quavered as I spoke.

An evil smile appeared on his face.  "I know how she was brutally murdered by the Kutou soldiers attacking your village.  I know how you, in your pain, summoned a horde of demons from the underworld to destroy your entire village.  And I know this because I am a god, and I was watching the events the entire time.  My servants rescued you when you fell unconscious and might have died from the sudden drainage of your power by the very demons that you summoned."

I stiffened.  "That is why I do not have any wish to hurt anyone."

"I see that I will not be able to convince you through any normal means, Miboshi."  He raised his arms up as dark energy swirled around him.  "You will regret it for all of eternity!"

Desperately, I tried to summon a shield, but the dark energy coursing from his easily broke through my barrier.

*******

It has been sixth months since Tenkou used his power on me.   It's only been sixth months since I have been turned into a sadistic monster, but it feels like all of eternity.

Somehow, his magic twisted my mind so that the part thinking of how much it was twisted is the only rational part left.  The rest of me wishes for all to be in pain, even myself.  But the magic does not allow me to harm myself, and it causes me to constantly want to fight off death.

I am no longer in my original body.  Once I was fully under Tenkou's control, he taught me how to steal another's body and destroy their soul.  To learn how to do so, I had to practice.  Now I am in the body of one of the youngest of the order that Tenkou is ruling.

I was also forced to push out his soul.  At least he is not suffering the torment that I am.

More than anything else, the dark magic of Tenkou is slowly twisting my soul.  I realize now that he is not a god, but some type of supreme demon or spirit.  The way my soul is being corrupted is proof of that.

Soon I will no longer be sane.  How long can I hold out?

My symbol, the one that designated me as a seishi of Seiryuu, no longer glows.  The dark power has also bound that also, and I can only access my power using the prayer wheel that Tenkou gave to me as a "gift."  It is more a sign of my enslavement.

The only way for me to escape all of this mental anguish and the dark spells and to heal my soul would be for me to die.  However, I cannot kill myself, and Tenkou lets no one else harm me.  Even changing into a new body does not help me.

And so I pass the next few months this way, until finally I have a chance to escape the dark palace.  Perhaps I should have stayed.  My dark urges are getting almost impossible to control.

A year later, I have fallen completely into darkness.

_KILL!  Kill!_  My mind is screaming at me as I approach a new village that is located by a lake.  Smiling cruelly, I summon a demon and send it to ravage the village ahead of me.

I observe the demon uncaringly.  The irony of it all is that the water demon that I have chosen today was the one that killed Hane three and a half years ago.  My heart skips a beat… almost… at the thought of Hane.  I haven't remembered her for sixth months, at the very least.  I shrug uncaringly; it no longer matters.

The delicious screams of the helpless villagers reach my ears, and my vision shows me that the monster is magically blasting whatever it cannot reach.  Soon, all too soon, the screaming stops.  My monster, its hunger satiated, willingly goes back to its own world.

I walk on to the village, casually picking up some food from the trashed market stalls in the village's center.  Today was their market day, I suppose.  Some blood from one of the stall owners' corpses has leaked onto the fruit that I've picked up, but I just casually wash it off and eat it.  It's not a problem.

A feeling of nostalgia hits me as I see a single survivor.  He looks just like I did… when?  I can't remember.  It doesn't matter.

I walk up to him and see that he's staring down at a corpse of a girl.  "Hey, kid," I say, "what village is this?"

He looks up at me with a face streaked by tears.  "They're dead… they're all dead…"

"I can _see_ that.  What village is this?"

"It was called Dragon's Lake…"

The name seems familiar, but I can't place it.  I don't care; the past isn't important anymore.  I wondered if I should possess the kid and kick out his soul.  I was getting tired of my current body.

The boy began to shudder.  His shock was wearing off.  He rocked back and forth… back and forth.  "I was in love with her… she's dead… she's dead!"  He began to sob uncontrollably.

The village… I remember it now.  This is the village where I grew up… when?  It doesn't matter.  It had obviously been rebuilt over the many years I was gone, but I had destroyed it.  Of course, I had been a fool to regret destroying it.  Destruction is pleasure.

Remembering my past gave me a headache.  It's bothersome to be weighted down by the past.

The kid was still sobbing, which usually annoys me enough for me to get rid of the irritation.  For some reason, however, I don't feel like killing him.  Instead, I simply walk out of the village, not killing him.  It would've been too much trouble anyway.

Years went in and out.  Twenty years… thirty years… more… I finally stopped bothering to count.  Whenever I got tired of my body, or it was starting to age, I tossed it away and got a new one.  It was no problem at all.  After all, murders happen every day.

I knew I was Miboshi of Seiryuu's Seven, but I couldn't care less.  Actually, I could, but that doesn't matter.  The only reason I would serve the priestess would be to gain power.

As even more years and bodies passed, I grew more and more bored with my life.  What was the point of killing all of these people and living forever?  It was starting to get boring until one day when I was just walking along the road as usual.  My new body was growing old; I knew that I would have to find a new one soon.

A troop of men passed by me.  They were soldiers of Kutou, judging by their outfits.  Almost gleefully, I summoned a demon that should've been able to slaughter them all.  Instead, the blonde man leading them used a blue chi spell to annihilate it!  I shrugged to myself and was going to go on without trying to kill them again, but the blonde man began to summon power for a spell that would have destroyed me where I stood.

I noticed that a blue character was glowing on his forehead.  It was the character for 'heart.'  "It is unwise to try to kill one of the Seiryuu Seishi if you plan to summon the beast-god," I told him indifferently as I waited for his reaction.

The man dropped the spell, but he did not look surprised at my statement.  I realized that he could be even colder and emotionless than I could.  "Who are you?"

"I am the demon summoner called Miboshi of the Seiryuu Shichiseishi."

Nakago smiled, but it was like a snake's uncaring smile.  "Then, Miboshi of the Seiryuu Seishi, you will join us."

He was more powerful than me, and I could not refuse.  I knew that my life would be quite different from now on.

~**TBC**~****

**Chibigreen's Notes:** My subconscious works against me!  Previously, Kano's full name had been Li Kano.  I just liked the name Li, you know?  Then, thanks to shadow priestess's review, I realize that "Li" was _way_ too similar to Houjun/Chichiri's surname of "Ri," so I changed it from "Li" to "Sei" in the first chapter.  But I can't change anything about the fiancée-being-dead situation.  It's not the same situation for Miboshi as it was for Chichiri anyhow.

**Flying heart** – I'm glad that some people _did_ like it.  I was tired of not knowing about Miboshi's past, so my imagination went into overdrive to make me write this.

**shadow priestess** – Thanks for the comment about Kano's last name.  I _did_ mean to change that… I think.

**Draconsis** – Yep, I was Chibigreenwizardmon.  I started to realize that that was too long to type, and Chibigreen Tanuki can easily be shortened to Chibigreen.  ^___^

**Melonydevil** – I never really _expected_ to be _writing_ a fic about Miboshi's past.  I tried to get the crazy idea out of my head, and in the end the only way I could was to write it down.

**Sansele** – Not every seishi has a poor dead _fiancée_.  Some have a poor dead little sister, a poor dead mother, a poor dead family, or a poor dead girl-who-had-a-crush-on-them.  There's variety, you see.

Did you know that I scared myself while writing the second part of this chapter?  It's _hard_ to write in first person when you're writing as a *insert words that Tasuki likes to use* evil person.  Hopefully, I wrote him evil enough to explain his attitude in the series…

If you have any questions for me about the story, ask them in a review.  I'll reply to them when I write the next chapter.  ^___^


	3. In Light

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Fushigi Yuugi.

**Warnings:** Angst, dark magic, demons, character death, and some spoilers for episodes 25 to 44.  There's also going to be a _slight_ spoiler for the OVAs.

**Chibigreen's Notes:** In the last chapter, the boy in the village was _not_ Chichiri, and I changed some bits in the previous chapter to show that.  Miboshi in my story is around seventy years older than Chichiri.  (I previously had him as hundreds of years older.)  I would say that he took a new body every six to ten years for around seventy years… you do the math.  All that the changes in the previous chapter do is point out that the village that Miboshi destroyed was, ironically enough, his hometown, and that there were _many_ years between that point and the summoning of Seiryuu.  Let's just say that he's not as old as the Byakko seishi… but he's pretty close.  I'd put down his year of birth only a year or two after Byakko was summoned.

**Astral Mikos** – I was hoping that _someone_ would feel sorry for Miboshi.  After all, a pitied, run-of-the-mill evil psycho bad guy is much better than your normal, run-of-the-mill evil psycho bad guy in my opinion.

**shadow priestess** – Um, thanks for reviewing…3 time.  Did you click too many times on the review button?  ^___^  It's a nice boost to my review count anyway…  ^___^   I hope that you like this last chapter.

**Sansele** – No, that was _not_ Chichiri in the village, as I explained in my notes above.  That shakujo of doom sounds interesting… And I'm glad that you liked my insertion of Tenkou.  ^___^

**CLAMPraven** – Thanks for reading this story.  I know that this story is much better than _The New Warriors_, but that's just the way it is.  But, um, Chichiri didn't appear, nope.  No matter how much of a rabid Chichiri fangirl I am, that wasn't Chichiri… ^___^

**Draconsis** – Nope, it wasn't Chichiri.  Anyway, it's hard to write as an evil person for me because I am not _evil_ evil.  I am a chibi SD type of evil, and that's why it was hard to write.  I don't think that Miboshi would run around throwing green balloons full of sugar water at people…

**Flying heart** – Yes!  One person _noticed_ that Miboshi was _way_ too old to be the cause of the destruction of Chichiri's village!  Congrats!  And thanks for adding this story to your favorites list.  ^___^

**Evil Hunter** – Nakago would have had _some_ idea of where Miboshi was and who he was, but it wouldn't have been specific.  Tenkou hadn't really been keeping an eye on Miboshi for sixty or more years, so he wouldn't have known specific details (such as what Miboshi's current body looked like).  And I _am_ crazy, just not a 'ooh let's go kill someone' type of crazy.

**PrincessKitty-Chan** – I'm sure that I'm not Yuu Watase 'cause then I would have been able to draw much better than I can!  (And if I'd had a say in it, Tasuki would end up with Chichiri.)

In Light (Part 3 of 3) 

The messenger screamed in agony as my cat demon bit him in half.  The cries of agony soothed the edges of my anger.

Nakago did know of my existence before he met me, it seems.  Tenkou told him.  Was my escape and everything that followed completely orchestrated by the god-demon?

Not that it matters.  If he did, if he didn't, it's all the same.  I am where I am, and I hate it.  Nakago controls everything in the palace: the emperor, though he does not realize it, the other seishi, who he manipulates through lies and emotions, and the army, who see him only as the invincible chosen warrior of a god.

I hate being manipulated, and I knew that he was using my lust for power against me.  I would kill him agonizingly slowly, but he is too powerful for me.  The other seishi, Tomo, Soi, Amiboshi, and Suboshi, would also fight against me.  However, Nakago realizes that he needs me to complete the summoning easily, so he provides me with victims to sooth me.

I flicked my fingers in a quick signal.  With a final crunching of bones, the unlucky messenger finally died with a rattling sigh.  Hearing the breath of life being released from a body was almost as enjoyable as hearing them shriek in pain.  I clenched my fist, and the gigantic demonic cat disappeared.

As always, my prayer wheel was spinning in my other hand.  The palace seemed to oppress my dark abilities to a point where I needed its help to concentrate my ki.  That only frustrated me more.

I want to get out of this place.

Nakago walked into my room and looked at the mess of the soldier on the floor.  He smirked.  "Venting your anger, Miboshi?"

Tenkou is using him, I can tell, but he's arrogant enough to believe he can get past the god-like being.  No one but a god would be able to hold off Tenkou.

Maybe that is his plan.  To become a god?  The idea is ridiculous, yet he believes that he can do it.

Damn him.

Nakago sent me to Sairou in search of the Shinzaho there.  I was to find it if I could, and if I could not I was to select a choice host and stay there until he arrived.

We wouldn't have needed the Shinzaho of Byakko if Amiboshi hadn't of died in Konan.  The idiot had managed to botch up Suzaku's summoning ceremony, but he died shortly after.  And he left Suboshi, his twin brother, in such a state of despair that Nakago was manipulating him easily.

Finally, I arrived in the capital of Byakko's Sairou.  By some chance, I stumbled upon information about a still-living member of the Byakko Shichiseishi named Tatara.  Supposedly, he knew where the Shinzaho was, but I was not able to find out where he was hiding.

For a new host, I chose the young monk who was the leader of a monastery inside the city.  It was only a slight difficulty to sneak into his sleeping quarters and overpower his soul.  He struggled at first, but soon I had forced him out of his body and into my previous one.  Then I quickly killed him.  I longed to torture him until he was begging for mercy, but there were more important matters to attend to.

My new body was so small and weak that I levitated to move.  Walking along the ground in the body did not appeal to me.

After I was sure that he dead, I sent out a type of lesser demon that possessed his followers and various statues around the monastery.  It subjected them to my every whim.  Usually, such a possession could be fought off, but they believed that they were following me because I was their leader.  In reality, the demon compelled them to obey.

I was bored again.  I could not torture the monks that served me because it could have induced someone to break out of their possessed state of mind, so I did not even hear any delicious screaming for a few months.  I did place a playful little trap for my amusement.  There was a tower above the town with a legend about it.  It was said that if two lovers kissed at the top of the tower at sunset, then their love would be eternal and nothing would ever separate them.

Seeing as it was a good place for my fun, I placed various demons in and around the tower.  Even if the visits to the tower dropped off after that, occasionally there was a particularly idiotic couple that would try to climb the tower.  The screams that I heard from the monastery were wonderful.

That hardly sufficed, but it was just enough.  I was almost settling comfortably in to my new position when it was disrupted.  Nakago and the rest of the Seiryuu Seishi arrived.  Curiously, Ashitare was not with them.  Apparently Nakago had finally realized just how ineffective he was after his human form was killed.  He _had_ managed to take out one of the Suzaku Seishi and steal a Shinzaho from them, but that was the most useful he's ever been.  He was worthless.

Soi was sent out to capture Tatara from the Byakko Shrine in the Imperial Palace.  She succeeded, of course, in another of her vain attempts to get her precious 'Nakago-sama' to fall in love with her.  If she weren't so powerful, I would call her pathetic to her face.  She's so young and naïve; she actually believes that 'love' exists.

Her rival for Nakago's love, Tomo, had also died.  I was told that Suboshi had killed him after the somehow-not-dead Amiboshi had tried to protect the Suzaku no Miko from him.  When it comes to his brother Suboshi is over-emotional.  Even if his brother had betrayed Nakago's cause, he still would protect him.  I think that Suboshi wouldn't be alive right now if Nakago couldn't manipulate him so easily.  He makes a good protector for the Seiryuu no Miko because he follows everyone he is attached to so blindly.

Tatara has still not told the location of Byakko's Shinzaho.  It's sickening, how loyal he is to his long-gone priestess.  He's in horrible pain right now; the complex spell that he is under kept him young in the shrine, but it's slowly killing him without Byakko's energy to keep it powered.  It's a pity that he's not screaming or begging for mercy.

And now I can sense a powerful, foreign ki.  If I'm right, it's that thrice-curse Suzaku no Miko.  Perhaps Nakago will let me torture her.

He didn't let me do anything but steal her voice.  Still, the look of shock in her eyes as my prayer wheel spun her speech away was nice.  Then she was thrown in the dungeon with that weak fool, Tatara.  He gave her the Shinzaho, and then Yui stole it from her.  Sometimes, she can almost be as cruel as Nakago.

Somehow Tatara escaped.  He tried to get Yui to give up the Shinzaho, but I summoned a few demons to keep him away.  He was able to fight them off by controlling vines that came out of a seed, but it was badly tiring him.  When the Suzaku no Miko and her warriors ran in with an old couple, he was distracted enough that my demons grabbed him to hold him hostage.

"If anyone moves, I'll kill him," I informed them smugly.  I hoped that one of them gives me an excuse to carry out my threat.

But I made the mistake of being slightly distracted when Nakago came and removed Yui-sama from the room.  Tatara regained control of his vines and pulled me in front of him even as my demon moved to kill him.  The large stinger went and pierced my heart.  With Tatara, I fell to the ground.  His last trace of energy had been used in the sudden attack.

I hated how they crowded around him as he gave them a sentimental goodbye as I lay there with the life draining out of me.

I didn't think that any of their bodies could be possessed by me until I spotted him.  He was apparently a member of the Suzaku Seishi, but he was young and standing apart from them.  His eyes showed his sadness and shock at seeing someone die, and I thought that he would be a perfect new body.

Quickly, I overpowered his spirit and moved into his body.  He screamed at the agony of having his soul suppressed suddenly.  I hadn't had enough time to push it out properly, but I could always do that after I destroyed the seishi.  I smiled at the irony that I would be using one of their own to destroy them as the Suzaku Seishi looked up at the boy's body.

"Chiriko!  What's wrong?" one of them asked concernedly.

A malicious smile appeared on my face.  "I am Miboshi of the Seiryuu Seven, and I claim this body as my own."  Children are so ridiculously easy to posses.

With my new body, I again rose into the air and summoned my prayer wheel.  The seishi looked at me with horror as the body of one of their own summoned demons to slaughter them.

How I regret possessing Chiriko!  He continues to fight me, even as I summoned a new, extremely powerful demon of the highest class.  The old couple, which had in reality been Tokaki and Subaru of the Byakko Seishi, had destroyed my other ones.  They had been able to return their bodies to their age ninety years ago.

As I controlled my demon to crush all of my opponents, a wave of resistance hit my mind.

_[I won't let you hurt them!]_ Chiriko cried as he used my prayer wheel to stab me/him in the arm.  Aloud, he begged for his friends to kill him so that I could not hurt them.

_{Shut up, you silly child!}_  I had never been resisted like that, but I took back control and again tried to destroy my enemies with my giant demon.

He continued to struggle.  _[NO!  I won't let you hurt them!]_  He shoved my tool into our leg and again begged for his friends to kill him.

_{I refuse to be beaten by a mere child!}_ I told him as I fought for control.  How could he possibly be so strong?!

_[They are my friends!  I won't let you hurt them!]_

How can a person be so loyal?  The world isn't like that.

Chiriko stabbed our body in the heart with my prayer wheel.  Life's blood sprayed as we fell to the ground.

_{Idiotic child!  Now we'll both die!}_ I yelled at him.

_[I had to kill myself to protect my friends.  You are a demon.  You do not control them; you _are_ one of them,]_ he told me as the pain became even worse.

His devastated friends wanted to heal him so badly, and all of them were crying.  But he would not let them, and in the end, only two remained to comfort him in his last moments.

I couldn't escape.  Somehow, there was a slight bond between our souls, and Chiriko had found it.  He was holding onto it with all of his strength, and I knew that my time to die had finally arrived.  I felt my power drain from me as Chiriko's friends comforted him.  The pain was hurting him badly.

A sudden flash of blue light, and I remembered all of my life before and after Tenkou.  No cruelty, no longing for a painful death tempered my view of reality.  I realized that the reason that I had been so cruel was because I wanted someone to treat me the same way.  I deserved it.

Feeling Chiriko's suffering, I used the last part of my power to block his pain by taking it into me.  _{Thank you,}_ I told him.

He was confused.  _[Why are you thanking me?]_  I could see him now.  Both of our souls were standing before the darkness of death.

My soul smiled as my features changed back into what they had been when I was Kano.  _{I've wanted to die for a long, long time, but I could never remember that I did.  My mind was twisted by evil magic, and only being this close to death has set me free.}_  Then I could no longer meet his gaze.  _{Please, forgive me for causing you to die.}_

He did not answer me, but instead he looked away.  ­_{One day I will, I think.}_

I was struck by his resemblance to Hane.  It couldn't be possible, could it?  Could Hane-chan have been reincarnated as the child whose death I caused?

I bowed my head.  _[You don't know how much I regret not being able to control the darkness…]_ I said as tears leaked from my eyes.  I could now tell that my soul bond with Hane was still in this child, her new incarnation.

I was like death's angel, always causing those around me to die though my true self wanted to be good.

Chiriko looked at me with some surprise in his eyes and in his voice.  _{I think… I do,}_ he said finally.  Could he feel the bond, too?

_[If we, by chance, meet again if we are reborn, I hope that I remember past the point that I fell into darkness.  If I do not, I will try to get past that point so that I will never hurt anyone again.  If I do not, please, Chiriko… Remember me as I am now, and not as I was.  For that is not my true self…]_ I pleaded with him.

He nodded cautiously.  _{I'll try.}_

_[Thank you.]_  A red light surrounded him, and a blue light surrounded me.  It protected us as we were pulled through the darkness.

And at the end of the darkness was light.

~**Owari**~


End file.
